Background

Jørgen Gustava Brandt was born on March 13, 1929, in Copenhagen, Denmark. He was a son of leather merchant.

Education

Jorgen Gustava Brandt studied painting in France in 1947-1948.

Career

Although Danish writer Jørgen Gustava Brandt is best known for his poetry, he has also written short stories, essays, and several novels. In the aftermath of World War II and under the shadow of the cold war, the modernists of the 1950s sought a way out of the cultural crisis, a way in which art and poetry, not the intellect, would form the foundation. Brandt was nineteen years old when Heretica came into being in 1948, but his byline soon appeared, attached to fiction and critical writings alongside those of such well-known writers as Karen Blixen, Thorkild Bjprnvig, Martin Hansen, Ole Wivel, Frank Jaeger, Tage Skou Hansen, and Klaus Rifbjerg. From the early 1960s onward, this diverse group of Danish intellectuals and writers set a new, innovative standard in Danish literature.

Brandt has gone on to publish more than forty collections of poems since his debut work, Korn i Pelegs mark. Brandt had his breakthrough with Fragment af imorgen. His collected poems Jørgen Gustava Brandt: digte 1946-1996, which was published in 1997, was a carefully handpicked selection chosen by the poet that comprises three volumes of about 600 poems and encompasses about half of his total production. Taken together, these collections represent the wide thematic and lyrical span of his works penned between 1946 and 1995. In his acclaimed Prcesentation: 40 danske digtere efter krigen, Brandt pens verbal portraits of other authors. Additionally, the author is also a painter, and some of his books feature his own artwork on the cover.

Torben Brostrpm, commenting on Brandt’s work in In-formation, looked back at Brandt’s thirty-year lyrical production, and remarked upon the poet’s frequent return to the same settings for his verse. However, the critic added, it has never become a repetitive exercise. Instead, this return can be interpreted as a musical theme with variations, a motif captured in a constantly changing optical lense. The favorite places in his universe are Dragpr, downtown Copenhagen, Amager’s natural resorts, the garden, the harbor, and the beach. Frequent trips to Italy and Israel have also inspired his poetry. In Korn i Pelegs mark, Peleg refers to a person in the Bible. This person, the Bible says, was living in a divided Israel, a divisiveness that is still highly actual, thousands of years later at the internal as well as the external level. Brandt has often returned to this theme, for instance in the poem David Projektørbelyst, which was written at the fifty-year jubilee of the Israeli State in 1998, wherein Brandt examines both the nature of war and the nature of love.

In the 1980s Italian scenery became a source of philosophical and historical inspiration for Brandt. Urolig meditation i et gammed fcestningsanlceg is a suite of poems that creates such atmospheric meaning. War and love become interwoven themes through both a look back to World War II and a view forward to the approaching end of the millennium. From the beginning, Brandt’s writings have often had associations with music, both classical and jazz. He has published historical papers on the interplay between music and literature and contributed an essay on the composer Ravel to Ikoner. Atten portrcetter af det 20. Arhundrede. Giv dagen dit lys contains seventeen songs and psalms, which were recorded with melodies by the Danish conductor Ole Schmidt. The poetry collection Denne kpnne musik encompasses thirty years of verse which reflect their author’s sense of melody and meter. And Brandt’s poem “Ninety-Nine” - about the former communist federation of Yugoslavia and war in Europe - was set to music and performed as an hour-long oratorio for choir, soloists, and symphony orchestra in the year 2000.

In his early career, Brandt worked for Denmark’s public radio station, and by the 1990s he was an active media personality, criticizing what he and many other professional artists consider the declining quality of Danish television’s coverage of music, literature, and art in general. Through both his fiction and his media contributions, Brandt continues to challenge the standard of quality in Denmark’s popular culture, by always insisting on work of a high caliber. He has likewise challenged Danish readers of poetry to embrace diversity, openness, and tolerance, with regard to their personal beliefs as well as in other matters.

Achievements

• The consistently high quality of Brandt's works places him among contemporary Denmark’s most prominent literary figures. Since the 1950s Brandt has earned respect among critics and well as other poets, including the younger generation. He was a contributor to the legendary modernist magazine Heretica and has continued to set his mark on the cultural debate ever since. His literature has been translated into English, Hebrew, French, German, Italian, Dutch, Polish, Swedish, Czech, and Hungaria languages.

Works

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  • Janushoved: Digte 1962
  • Oh Israel 1978
  • Vise om vejen til Emmaus: Et digt 1984

Views

Brandt, while making mystical experiences and other complex issues more understandable and integrated, he has incorporated a new and original mythology wherein demons, gnomes, and other supernatural beings populate everyday Danish localities. In Brand'ts his own text he perceives a contained universe with its own geographic, historic, and spiritual atmosphere.

Membership

Jørgen Brandt is a member of Danish Academy, Statens kunstfonds udvalg for den litteraere kunst, Danish PEN and Danske Sprogmaevn.

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  Danish Academy , Denmark

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  Statens kunstfonds udvalg for den litteraere kunst , Denmark

• Danish PEN , Denmark

• Danske Sprogmaevn , Denmark

Connections

Jørgen Gustava Brandt is married to Birgit Karin Brandt. They have two sons.

Wife:

Birgit Karin Brandt

References

• Contemporary Authors New Revision Series: A Bio-Bibliographical Guide to Current Writers in Fiction, General Non-Fiction, Poetry, Journalism, Drama, Motion Pictures, Television, and Other Fields
  2010